Why I do secondary fermentation

[Reneauj62]

OK, I can assure every one, that most of my beers meet the most important judge,,, ME. I am not making beer for any body else. I have no pretense (or daddy goggles as was so eloquently said) that it is the best and could not taste better. But I also have a budget to my beer making. $200 here, $100 there, to me, is $300 that I could spend on ingredients, not hardware to make my crappy beer a little bit better. I seldom if ever see anyone use a scale on how much better their beer is after they spend $$$ on the latest and greatest hardware. Did your beer go from "3" to "5",,"7" to "9" or better yet "2" to "8" when you spent $300?
Some of you are in the hobby to make world class beer and have the means to do it. Some of us just make (now I question) drinkable beer. I guess I'd rather have 30+ gal of "my quality" beer than 5 gal of "perfect" for the same investment.
I hope I don't come off sounding like I don't appreciate all the experimenting and research that some of you do and your helpful comments, quite the opposite really, I would probably enjoy some of your "failures" as much as I do my meager results.
Cheers,
Joel B.

Well said. I once was into photography and bought $8,000 for the high end camera (only the best) and various lenses.. The end result was I still sucked at photography. The equipment does not make the brewer, or photographer.

 

[jddevinn]

We are discussing processes not expensive equipment.

 

[McKnuckle]

^Totally agreed. Let's not conflate the two. You don't need shiny gear to put sound brewing principles into practice. This discussion is about the principles.

 

[Reneauj62]

We are discussing processes not expensive equipment.

Maybe you should read the post I responded to before being snarky. or use the ABC rule.

 

[Reneauj62]

^Totally agreed. Let's not conflate the two. You don't need shiny gear to put sound brewing principles into practice. This discussion is about the principles.

That is EXACTLY our point. Geesh!!

 

[jddevinn]

That is EXACTLY our point. Geesh!!

Advocating to use a secondary is not decreasing equipment, it is increasing it. Advocating to use a secondary without any oxygen purging is increasing equipment and ignoring known and proven brewing science.

 

[Dgallo]

Maybe you should read the post I responded to before being snarky. or use the ABC rule.

The only post that talked about money was my post regarding bottling ipas verses kegging ipas. At it was talking about getting the equipment for that verses spending extra money on pbw and standard and time. Wasn’t a suggestion to this thread. Just a direct response to another member

 

[Bobby_M]

What I have learned, in this particular group, is that if "some" people disagree with you they will insult you, belittle you, challenge your intelligence and be mean.

It's weird. There isn't a single insult in this thread. No one has been belittled. In fact, the only times insults were brought up they were done as pre-emptive self deprecation. The OP said "I realize there are a number of fellow homerbrewers whom put down, pooh-poh, criticize, act if I’m a complete reta*d and diminish doing a secondary". He was met with respectful disagreement, which I assume is the expected outcome of posting something like that.

The next time insults were brought up, snuffy said " I disagree that if you don't avoid air exposure at all cost, you're a brewtard..."

Note that no one called him a "Brewtard"... he did so hypothetically.

Red Herring.

 

[Taket_al_Tauro]

I looked at that post #278 and also from what I’ve seen from @Taket_al_Tauro , he only bottling his ipa and doesn’t keg, so his post would only show the findings of the best bottling techniques, not a comparison(if I am incorrect here please correct me). My goal would be to see you if there is a detectable difference from doing the best possible reduction of DO levels bottling vs. kegging with the triangle test using the same batch of beer. I’d simply report my finding and let you decide. That way people who continue to brew hoppy styles can determine if the $200+ investment in kegging is worth it (for me it’s worth it in time, pbw, and starsan alone)

You are absolutely correct, I only bottle condition so I cannot provide a comparison with the same beer closed transferred to keg.
From what I gleaned from his posts, @tyrub42 might be the one who does both things. I seem to recall reading that if he has to bottle hoppy stuff, then bottle conditioning (of course by taking the necessary precautions) will give him better shelf life than kegging, force carbonating and then bottling.

 

[Snuffy]

I didn't know my beer sucked in 2007 until I tasted my beer in 2009 and then I didn't know that beer sucked until I tasted my beer in 2014 and on and on. Everyone thinks their homebrew is amazing and perfectly executed but it's a lot of proud papa goggles. If you don't accept for a minute that you might be able to improve by doing research, experimenting and sometimes listening to others who have done those experiments, your beer will only be as good as it is right now. There are plenty of people who are perfectly Okay with that. We, collectively, probably need to let those people continue being happy with their "possibly" less than amazing beer.

This is probably right on the money. I know going into these kinds of discussions that I really don't have a leg to stand on technically. I know it's bad form. I'm basically saying, "What - Me Worry?". My wife is a perfectionist. Me, not so much, and we drive each other crazy sometimes. But hanging out with her improves me. I think hanging out here may do something similar.
I've based my opinion of success or failure in this hobby on comparing what I brew to the craft beer I pay far too much for in tap rooms and pubs. So far, I'm not disappointed. Here's to that elusive perfect pint. I'll know it when I find it.

 

[Snuffy]

The point of that video is basically, "use the correct bell and fill to the correct level, and you'll reduce the chances of sucking fluid into the fermenter." But that doesn't have anything to do with dissolution and subsequent diffusion of O2.

TBH, I watched about 20 seconds of it. I was just being a smartass.

 

[Snuffy]

The variation in quality of home made wine is on the same playing field as beer. The main difference is that sophisticated wine makers use additions of metabisulfite at various stages of the process to mitigate the oxygen damage. That, combined with the fact that wine benefits from small amounts of oxidation in its flavor maturation, makes it tolerate oxygen from careless transfers. Without sulfites, storing wine in buckets and racking with racking canes will definitely show age quickly (poorly) in the bottles.

I never really intended to draw process parallels between making wine and brewing beer. It was just a stepping stone... my gateway drug. And the basic equipment was there.

 

[togodoug]

All this proves is that you transferred that trub from your primary to your secondary. If you took more care and crashed your primary, than it would have been left behind there. Which diminishes the need for a secondary and avoids the oxidation, VDK, and acetaldihyde risks from using a secondary

Without a secondary how would you dry hop? I would guess just open up the fermenter and drop the hops on top? But they float, no? Or is that ok? I’ve done secondary when I started dry hopping IPA. As far as clarity and all can’t say it’s helped much if any.

 

[day_trippr]

I ferment in 6.5 gallon glass, and any post-pitch hopping gets done just as simply as that: pop the bung and quickly dump the pellets in before stuffing the bung back in. Almost never a secondary vessel involved before kegging. Trust me, in the scheme of things, there's way less potential for damage done that way than racking the entire batch into another vessel just to add hops.

Yes, pellet mush floats, at least until the yeast stop exhaling. It probably makes more sense to wait until the yeast are utterly done to even start dry hopping, but for us impatient mortals that can be moved up by cold-crashing to knock the yeast out.

There has always been the classic proposal that a secondary was needed to "clarify" the beer. But if one takes a moment to consider the basic biological processes at play, it simply doesn't make any sense that racking beer off the yeast cake will accelerate clarity, as there will still be yeast extant, and if there are residual fermentable sugars remaining they'll keep eating and keep farting which will prolong the haze...

Cheers!

 

[Taket_al_Tauro]

Now I think I’m going to try this with a few bottles before I keg. Then I can do a blind triangle test with my club and see if they can detect a difference. Not doubting that you can bottle a NEIPA and have it not oxidize to hell but I would believe there will be drop in aroma and flavor vs. closed transferring to a fully purged keg.

Please do post your results if you do this test! But I certainly won't delude myself by believing or hoping that the bottled version will come out just as good as the kegged one...

 

[faithie999]

I am glad to follow the advice to skip secondary and rack right to my keg. my potentially dumb question is should I let the keg sit at cellar temperature for a few weeks, depending on the beer, or put it right into the kegerator and let it age there?

 

[VikeMan]

Without a secondary how would you dry hop?

If you have a conical that can be pressurized, you can use something like this:

 

[VikeMan]

I am glad to follow the advice to skip secondary and rack right to my keg. my potentially dumb question is should I let the keg sit at cellar temperature for a few weeks, depending on the beer, or put it right into the kegerator and let it age there?

Assuming it was actually ready to keg (reached final gravity, no off flavors), then keep it cold, unless you want to accelerate aging/staling.

 

[Bobby_M]

Without a secondary how would you dry hop? I would guess just open up the fermenter and drop the hops on top? But they float, no? Or is that ok? I’ve done secondary when I started dry hopping IPA. As far as clarity and all can’t say it’s helped much if any.

It's a bit of a paradox. Moving a beer in order to dry hop can expose it to more oxygen which will kill hop character. I dry hop in the primary at various stages. If I'm going for a hazy/juicy NEIPA with biotransformation it goes in on day 3 of fermentation. If it's something else, I'll wait until fermentation is almost done and toss them in with the least bit of air ingress as possible. Actually I'll carefully toss them in and leave the lid a little loose while I push low pressure CO2 in for about 2 minutes to purge air out.

 

[hot427cobra]

I started reading all of the comments above and there are many different opinions on whether to use a secondary fermenter or not. Some asked how to transfer without introducing oxygen into the beer. This is my process. First off, I use 6.5 gallon glass carboys and keg my beers. I have a racking cane that is pushed through the center port on the orange colored carboy caps that are sold. Not sure what they are called exactly. The second side port I have inserted a barbed hose fitting on it. When its time to transfer from one carboy to the next, I first take my CO2 tank and put the hose into the secondary carboy that is already Star San. I turn open the tank valve and let CO2 freely dispense into the carboy with the hose stuck down into it. My understanding is that CO2 is heavier than O2 and therefore it sinks to the bottom of the vessel and therefore pushes out the oxygen in the carboy. It only takes a matter of a few seconds to displace the O2 out of the carboy. I then place the racking cane into the primary carboy with the orange cap loosely fitted over the top of the carboy opening. I slide the CO2 hose onto the barbed fitting on the orange cap. Now turn on the CO2 tank valve and slightly push down on the orange cap to make a temporary seal on the carboy lip and bingo, you have started a syphon started from one carboy to the other. Let go of the orange cap as you no longer need the seal and turn off the CO2 tank. The end of my racking cane is at the bottom of the receiving carboy and in theory protected from any O2 as it dispenses gently underneath the CO2 blanket that previously was dumped in. Later on when its time to transfer from secondary to a keg, I use the same method to first purge the keg with CO2 and use the orange cap with the racking cane to start the syphon. The one warning is not to place the orange cap all the way down on the carboy lip making a tight seal. Wouldn't want too much pressure to build in glass carboy if your CO2 regular was set too high. When I do turn on the tank valve, the orange cap is totally loose and you can hear the CO2 hissing out freely. The slightest amount of holding the orange cap onto the carboy lip starts to push the beer up the racking cane to get the syphon going. I hope this helps shed light on another process to consider in your brewing.

 

[jddevinn]

My understanding is that CO2 is heavier than O2 and therefore it sinks to the bottom of the vessel and therefore pushes out the oxygen in the carboy. It only takes a matter of a few seconds to displace the O2 out of the carboy.

This is not correct. Gasses freely mix. You will have slightly diluted the air content with CO2.

CO2 blanket

No such thing.

 

[VikeMan]

I turn open the tank valve and let CO2 freely dispense into the carboy with the hose stuck down into it. My understanding is that CO2 is heavier than O2 and therefore it sinks to the bottom of the vessel and therefore pushes out the oxygen in the carboy. It only takes a matter of a few seconds to displace the O2 out of the carboy.

The CO2 and the O2 will happily make a homogeneous mixture. The more CO2 you add, the more dilute the O2 concentration will become (assuming gases can escape). But it would take an awful lot of CO2 to get to the point where there is almost no O2 remaining. The fact that a CO2 molecule is heavier than an O2 molecule isn't really relevant. Both gasses are energetic and will diffuse completely.

As an analogy, imagine a bucket filled with, I dunno, cherry coolaid. Insert a garden hose, and flow water into the bucket. How quickly do you think the liquid in the bucket will be all water?

 

[Dgallo]

. Deleted.

 

[jddevinn]

When I had carboys I would use one of those caps to get ~1psi to transfer to a purged (CO2 used to push degassed StarSan out to purge) keg. It was the best way I could come up with and I was still afraid that at some point I would over pressure and shatter one of the carboys. It is much easier with a conical, however there are other cheaper options. One of which was listed earlier in this thread.

Without displacing a liquid you need to purge a LOT to get O2 levels down to acceptable. Especially at low pressure. Even if you went up to 10psi you would need over 20 complete purges. Very hard to do with a carboy.

(those orange caps are also VERY oxygen permeable)

 

[day_trippr]

That is not going to do what is presumed - by far.
It takes something like 30x the carboy volume to drive the O2 content down to tactical levels...

Cheers!

 

[Beermeister32]

Some of the British styles ferment in "Beer Squares." It would be interesting to discuss CO2 / O2 issues with this procedure!

 

[McKnuckle]

Yorkshire squares always have a thick layer of krausen on top which protects against oxygen and airborne critters. When the beer nears terminal gravity, they drop the beer into a settling tank to condition it at a lower temp. At that point it is no longer open to the ambient air.

It's worth noting that the bulk of the tank, and hence the fermenting beer, is actually below the floor. At the bottom of the visible square is an opening through which the yeast rises up and is periodically pushed back down by the sprayer that you see to the brewer's right. Of course that does indeed oxygenate a portion of the beer.

Yes, it is interesting.

 

[VikeMan]

Of course that does indeed oxygenate a portion of the beer.

I would go so far as to say that oxidized flavors are a "feature" of Samuel Smith beers.

 

[McKnuckle]

I would go so far as to say that oxidized flavors are a "feature" of Samuel Smith beers.

Well, I've had most of the styles they export to the U.S. and I can't say I agree. I have even had bottles lie around for months before drinking, and they don't deteriorate, so they can't really be oxidized. The styles do all share a unique flavor which I attribute to yeast, mineralized water, and diacetyl. I would kill to reproduce it in my home brewery!

 

[VikeMan]

Well, I've had most of the styles they export to the U.S. and I can't say I agree. I have even had bottles lie around for months before drinking, and they don't deteriorate, so they can't really be oxidized. The styles do all share a unique flavor which I attribute to yeast, mineralized water, and diacetyl. I would kill to reproduce it in my home brewery!

I'll just say that oxidized compounds are numerous and varied. And not all are necessarily unpleasant. (Diacetyl, for example.) I used to do imperial stout fermentations low and slow, in a plastic bucket, for that reason.

 

[Beermeister32]

Back in the 1960's Dad would ferment his illegal beer in a 15 gallon crock with a towel over the top. The smell was fantastic!

 

[Wolffie]

Some of the British styles ferment in "Beer Squares." It would be interesting to discuss CO2 / O2 issues with this procedure!View attachment 712270

I want on of those,

 

[tyrub42]

You are absolutely correct, I only bottle condition so I cannot provide a comparison with the same beer closed transferred to keg.
From what I gleaned from his posts, @tyrub42 might be the one who does both things. I seem to recall reading that if he has to bottle hoppy stuff, then bottle conditioning (of course by taking the necessary precautions) will give him better shelf life than kegging, force carbonating and then bottling.

I just bottle condition, as I just don't have the space for ANOTHER fridge that I'd need for kegging .

That said, there will never be a way to prove which method is 'better' because it'll honestly come down to the practices of the brewer. There's no reason that you cant have very good beer with either method and they have very clear advantages and disadvantages (keg advantages: shorter turnaround time, less exposure to open air if doing proper used transfer, faster and simpler. Bottling advantages: active yeast left in suspension help to keep the beer fresher for longer IF you can nail your practices, which is something most bottlers don't bother to do).

In the end, I wouldn't worry about which one is better outright, I would just keep those factors in mind and use the method that makes sense for your situation. If you're brewing a batch of beer to all be consumed in one sitting (wedding or other party for example), kegging clearly makes more sense. If you're going to be drinking a batch slowly over time, I'd say bottling makes more sense and is likely to give you enjoyable beer for a longer time. Either way, the enemy is the same so it's just a matter of keeping O2 out of your business

 

[jddevinn]

I'd say bottling makes more sense and is likely to give you enjoyable beer for a longer time.

Unless you get enough kegs With 10 taps I've had kegs of 'specialty' beer on tap for 10+ months. Before I started being "anal" about O2 most would deteriorate after ~2-4 months depending on style. My first NEIPA was bad a month after tapping the first keg.

I've just changed all my "red CO2" line out for EVA barrier tubing. I'm hopping this lets me keep kegs stable for even longer.

If I bottled all of the beer currently in the bar I'd look like a bottle shop I've saved every Champaign bottle anyone has opened at the house for ~6 years thinking I'll bottle condition a larger Belgian but have never gotten around to it.

 

[OldDogBrewing]

The goop is called trub, it's basically proteins, hops and yeast, it won't harm your beer because it came from your beer

 

[OldDogBrewing]

and people here (and over in /r/homeberewing) are continuing to discuss how they are able to successfully package NEIPAs using bottles.

Like many other things in life, it will likely take some time to confirm that those processes are both effective and safe - and to convince the community of its safety and effectiveness.

I successfully package hoppy beers in bottles, but there's a big but, I brew 1 gallon batches which means the beer is gone in a week if I only drink that for a week. If I kept them longer, probably they will get skunk in 3-4 weeks

 

[Beermeister32]

Skunking is typically caused by excess UV exposure, typical from clear or green glass bottles. Brown glass does a better job at protecting against skunking beer.

 

[Vale71]

The goop is called trub, it's basically proteins, hops and yeast, it won't harm your beer because it came from your beer

You're wrong on so many levels...

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

... I brew 1 gallon batches ... If I kept them longer, probably they will get skunk in 3-4 weeks

If you want to "up your game", check out One Gallon Brewers Unite - probably starting in the year 2018. The current "bottling NEIPA" topics would be a good second step.

 

[OldDogBrewing]

You're wrong on so many levels...

Well as far as I'm aware, matter can't be created out of nowhere so everything in there comes from your beer.

And I've had beers on the yeast cake for months and no off flavours, so yeah, someone in a 30 years old book can say whatever he wants about autolysis, but my experience tells me that there's nothing bad in having my beer for a month in primary as beers that stood longer (both dark and light beers) didn't present any kind of issues